Personal Shield Pro: what it is and how to remove it

Personal Shield Pro is a program that was installed on the PC, most likely together with something else you downloaded. Free software sites and many installers add extra programs on setup pages with pre-ticked boxes, so the extra install looks like your choice even though nobody read the page.

Check the install date in Settings, Apps, Installed apps: the program you installed that day is the probable carrier. If you do not need Personal Shield Pro, uninstall it. If it belongs to your hardware or to a program you use, search its exact name and publisher first, because drivers and their tools can have unfamiliar names.

Something else is reinstalling it. Common causes are a second program from the same publisher, a scheduled task that downloads it again, or a browser extension that keeps prompting for it. Sort Installed apps by install date and uninstall each entry from the same day that you did not choose.

Then open Task Scheduler and look in the Task Scheduler Library for tasks with updater-style names that you do not recognise. Check Startup apps in Task Manager too. If Personal Shield Pro still returns, start Windows in Safe Mode, uninstall it there and run a Microsoft Defender offline scan, which looks for loaders that ordinary scans can miss.

Not until you check. While connected, the caller could install other programs, create a user account or look at saved passwords. Disconnect from the internet, uninstall the remote access program and anything else installed during the call, and run a full scan and the Microsoft Defender offline scan.

From another device, change your e-mail and banking passwords and turn on two-step verification. If the caller opened your online banking, call the bank today. A reset of Windows is the safest option if you cannot tell what was done.

Call your card issuer using the number on the back of the card, report the purchase as fraud and ask for a new card. Ask them to block further charges from the same merchant. Watch your statements for small test charges, which often come before larger ones.

If you used a password on the order page or the same e-mail for the purchase, change that password and expect phishing e-mails that mention the purchase. Your bank can also tell you whether the merchant is linked to other fraud reports.

Some scareware does not register an uninstaller, or its uninstaller only opens another sales page. In that case, end the program in Task Manager, then go to Task Manager > Startup apps, right-click its entry and choose Open file location to find its folder. Disable the startup entry, restart in Safe Mode and delete the folder.

Check Task Scheduler for tasks with the same name. Finally, run the Microsoft Defender offline scan, which removes remaining files that Microsoft knows about. Restart afterwards and check that nothing named after Personal Shield Pro starts again.

No. Windows 11 and Windows 10 include Microsoft Defender in Windows Security, which provides real-time protection, scheduled scans, the offline scan and protection against unwanted apps at no cost. Keep it switched on and updated, and turn on Reputation-based protection under App & browser control.

If you prefer a third-party product, buy it from the vendor's own site after reading independent test results, never from a pop-up or a phone call. The lesson of Personal Shield Pro is that security offers which arrive unasked are the ones to avoid.

Three things give it away. It appears as personal Shield Pro in the list of installed apps, a window from a program rather than from Windows Security. It pushes you to act quickly by calling, paying or downloading.

And the threats it reports never show up when you run a scan in the real Windows Security app. Microsoft does not put phone numbers in warnings or charge for removing threats through pop-ups. Close the window, do not call, and follow the steps to find and uninstall the program behind it.

Not by itself, as far as reports show. Programs that display personal Shield Pro in the list of installed apps are built to scare people into paying or calling; they rarely take data on their own.

The risk comes from what you did in response: typing card details into the program, or letting a caller connect to your PC. If you did neither, uninstalling the program is enough. If you did either, treat that information as exposed:

• block the card
• change passwords from another device
• remove any remote-access tool that was installed

Only if the signs point to deeper access. Reset when you see personal Shield Pro in the list of installed apps again after removal, when Windows Security cannot start or update, when remote access tools you did not install keep appearing, or when you simply cannot trust the PC any more.

Otherwise, the plan in this guide plus an offline scan is enough. If you do reset, choose Remove everything and Cloud download for a fresh copy of Windows, restore only documents and photos, and reinstall programs from their official sites. Change important passwords from the clean system afterwards.

Fortect scans Windows for malware and unwanted programs and repairs the system files and settings they change, and its free scan shows what it finds on your PC before you decide anything.

For Personal Shield Pro, follow the plan above as well: the browser steps take back permissions and settings that no scanner treats as a threat, and uninstalling the program that brought it removes the source.

Run Microsoft Defender's full scan and, if anything was found, its offline scan as a second opinion. If the symptoms are gone after the plan and both scans are clean, there is nothing more to do.